


Exercises of Futility

by Hyacinthium



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Ambiguous Character Death, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Emetophobia, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Hanahaki Disease, Heavy Angst, Hospitalization, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, One-Sided Relationship, Pre-Game Personalities (New Dangan Ronpa V3), Retrospective, Terminal Illnesses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-31
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-01 15:31:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17246747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hyacinthium/pseuds/Hyacinthium
Summary: It's easy to know that you don't love someone. Especially when you're just using them. Right up until they end it with you, and trigger the growth of flowers in your lungs.Maybe those flowers were already there though.Just waiting for Saihara to catch on and leave for someone that actually loved him from the start.





	1. Innocence

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a warm up a few days ago. Thanks to my friends for getting the idea, after we saw fanart of pg Kokichi lying about liking pg Shuichi... 
> 
> Hey, Happy New Year!

Things have gone horrifically wrong. Ouma Kokichi likes to think that he's a realist too, so he's not just being dramatic. It's a simple and factual statement that his plans have failed, that he has failed, and that it's all his fault. Being indignation over it isn't even something justifiable. Kokichi set himself up for this from the very start. All this guilt eating away at him is valid. 

So are the flowers on his pillows. Ugly, misshapen, miscellaneous gray errors with no genus to speak. Covered in blood and saliva the way they should be.

He can perfectly understand and retrace his logic. Saihara is one year older, he's from a rich family, his parents are never home. The other boy is semi-isolated having friends, because of his enthusiasm for Danganronpa. Among other objective things that add up to similar qualities. Saihara was just the perfect opportunity around- a perfect tool for Kokichi to use. The best possible target for him to befriend. So for someone like Kokichi with a much worse home life... 

Naive, lonely, and oh so vulnerable in his barely concealed desperation. 

And Kokichi is a cute specimen. He's adorable and non-threatening with large doe eyes. He knows exactly how to look totally pathetic. Sometimes it gets him out of trouble, after all. 

How could he resist approaching a rich and sheltered mega fan? 

By being a decent human being, but Kokichi digresses.

Friendship only though- that's all that Kokichi has ever had intentions for. He only wants to use other people as reoccurring loot bags. There's no wish to essentially go on compensated dates just to move up in the world. Really, it's not like he's perverting the meaning of friendship either. Friends do things for friends. It's just an exchange and a social transaction. Kokichi merely takes it a step further by selecting who he's going to trade with.

Companionship in exchange for items. Like completing a party member's personal quest in order to get something good. 

That's what Saihara was supposed to be.

Instead, Kokichi is stuck staring at the way his blood stains fabric and lifeless flower petals. All because the Saihara Shuichi from all those months ago decided to confess. 

The boy leans forward and picks up one of the aberrations. Gray and dry, the petals crumble as he rolls them between two pale fingers. It's as if all the color in him is being given to these things. Except that each one is just as unhealthy as he is. They're using him as fertilizer and don't even have the courtesy of looking nice. No beautifully tragic roses screaming or noble forget-me-nots for Ouma Kokichi. His little pity me bouquet is going to be these. Twisted and aborted attempts to create flora out of his twisted and aborted feelings. 

Purple eyes drift over to the window as their owner considers what it means. The fact that his hanahaki takes such a form. How his feelings aren't real enough to grow actual flowers, and that they're still killing him anyway.

Everything goes downhill when your money baggage friend tells you that they love you. It's even worse when it's someone like Saihara. All that 'barely functioning and affection starved' in one person is never a good thing. Combining it with an intense love for Danganronpa can be legitimately frightening too. Kokichi knew this at the time and knows it now. Not that Saihara ended up being one of those fans. 

But he could have been and Kokichi should have said no. 

Kokichi didn't say no. 

Technically speaking, he knows why he accepted the confession. Kokichi is a greedy little shit. He wants out of what he has. Which means that he cannot possibly accept a situation where he grows apart from Saihara. That's just how his horrible logic works. 

So he's been dating Saihara until three days ago.

Falling onto his bed aggravates coughing and Kokichi does it anyway. His throat is already clogged with scratchy petals. The boy barely sees a point in considering it. Those adults called parents have been out for a week. Probably doing another drunken bender of gambling and illegal activities. Going to a doctor will ensure that everyone knows. 

Kokichi wonders if Saihara is worried. Skipping is the opposite of what either of them do. Maybe it was obvious from the start that each 'I like you too' was a lie. The things in his chest clench around him.

Each kiss, each hand in hand moment, all those dates and the marathons too. None of it should be considered real. Saihara is an annoying fanboy that Kokichi has been using for his own gain. That's all that anything ever was. He should accept that Saihara dumped him and move on. Kokichi has plenty of other people to attach to now. 

Dying alone from one setback is pathetic.

Moments pass as Kokichi lays on his side, and the boy understands perfectly what he actually wants right now. It's the most sickeningly cliche thing. 

Ouma Kokichi wants to apologize. To get down on his hands and knees before admitting that each thing was a self-serving falsehood. After that, to beg for Saihara Shuichi to take him back. None of these grotesque lumps explain anything about what his feelings are. Useless and ugly. That's all that Kokichi can gather from the damn things. Perhaps that's all he needs to know too. Kokichi is simply useless and ugly on the inside. A truly horrible person who doesn't care about anyone. 

He misses the quiet dates and how warm Saihara is when they hug. He misses the feeling of that clammy hand making their fingers intertwine. He misses the conversations that kept them up all night long. He dreams about waking up with a worried Saihara asking if he's had another nightmare, again. 

Kokichi misses his friend, and misses his boyfriend, but he knows that he has not a single right to even beg.

A spiteful and morbid part of Kokichi hopes that Saihara gets hanahaki for him after he dies. It's a sudden thought that has the boy staring into his sheets. His eyes become irritated from how dry they are, but Kokichi can barely remember to blink. Of all the stupid shit to come out of his brain... 

It's not the worst, probably.

Kokichi sighs as the itchy taste of metal buildings up alongside saliva. He forces himself up and off of his bed. Stumbling feet guide him to the toilet after his body bangs into a dozen different things. Doors, furniture, and even some tripping on air. It feels like time is a suggestion made of lightheadedness. One minute he's struggling to walk and the next his face is looming over a dirty toilet. Blood and flowers stare back up at him. 

"Again with this, huh?" Kokichi murmurs lazily, eyelids swollen and gaze filled with faux apathy. Feeling the churning of his insides and the start of uncontrollable coughing, the boy just smiles bitterly. 

Hopefully it will stop soon.


	2. Malice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shuichi’s side of the story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I cried.

It starts with Harukawa walking up to him with a wide frown, worry in her red gaze and 'Ouma-kun hasn't been to school in a week and his parents aren't around'. Except that, as Shuichi’s well watched protagonists will say, that's wrong. This current situation starts around one week ago. In a small café with two boys looking at one another. Put into motion by something that Shuichi is ready to admit was a horrible mistake. 

He lied. 

With one single speaking of falsehoods- Saihara Shuichi got to witness the exact moment in which Ouma Kokichi's heart broke. He has regretted it ever since the third day. 

Since then, no one has seen even a mirage of Ouma’s person. The first few days weren't too bad. Ouma often remarks on how much he'd love to stay in bed when upset. To say nothing of whatever upset the break up must be causing. He can still remember the porcelain doll appearance born from those words. A reaction so genuine that Shuichi expected to see tears. Wide eyes, barely parted lips, glassy and motionless in shock heralding a stilted acceptance. 

His words were akin to, 'I'm breaking up with you. Ouma-kun only dated me because I pressured him. Harukawa-san and I get along more naturally...'

At the time it had been like victory. Contentment and satisfaction are two words that could describe how Shuichi felt in the first two days. Finally seeing nothing but a sincere reaction had been catharsis after months of not knowing or understanding. All the hints of confusion or dismay, followed by hesitation on Ouma’s part- instinctive attempts to reach and grab Shuichi’s hands- resulted in what Shuichi can only peg as desolation. Then the boy left, something that Shuichi first replayed as more triumph. Now that memory is nothing more than the worst thing he's ever done. 

Leaving that lost looking, about to cry, Ouma Kokichi behind was an attempt to stir up jealousy. 

It had made Shuichi feel drunk. 

Now it makes the flowers flare up when they should be gone. All of his excuses and reasons are crumbling as he walks down beaten up roads. The hanahaki hasn't gone away, even after the confession to Ouma. Not totally abnormal if still fairly worrisome to his doctors. Instant curing from just basic acceptance only exists in fiction. Except that even the passing of months, full of hard work to earn Ouma’s love, still left Shuichi with a semi-steady supply of flower petals. Things didn't improve at all. 

Until he met Harukawa, a quietly cheerful girl with a good grip on relationships and a love of Danganronpa that rivals Shuichi’s own. Never before had anyone so easily clicked with him. Over time and after many conversations... 

Shuichi applied all lessons but saw no progress with Ouma actually be genuine in his affections. Yet the flowers stopped and Shuichi was due for a natural final expelling of his hanahaki. 

Keyword being was. 

Grimacing, Shuichi stops walking in favor of looking at his destination. He adjusts his hat and fiddles with the charm on his school bag. The house honestly looks more like a shack. Falling apart, rusted, a crumbling thing that probably freezes over in the winter. Everything in this neighborhood is like this. It all smells of smoke and cheap booze. Ouma greatly protests even the possibility of Shuichi ever coming here. The one time he has, the other boy suddenly ushered him out after receiving a call from his parents. Shuichi honestly tries not to think about it too much. It's just not his business unless Ouma says something. 

The thing is that Shuichi lies even to hide, he slowly acknowledges. He has told himself over and over again that breaking up was 'because I got over my crush and he still doesn't love me'. In addition was, 'I still value him as a friend and I can't force him to stay in such an unwanted relationship'.

All lies. Shuichi had just wanted to get back at the other boy for horrible, selfish, and entitled reasons. 

Nothing else had motivated him and yet he'd refused to be honest about it. 

Shuichi grits his teeth and walks up the decrepit door of the Ouma residence. Peeling paint stares at him like one those weaker smiles. He just hopes that someone will answer. Raising a hand to it, he rings the doorbell once. 

Twice. 

Five times. 

It slowly creaks open to reveal the face of who Shuichi quickly identifies as Ouma's mother. The woman is gaunt and narrowing her eyes already, unhealthily pale with various signs of drug abuse prematurely aging her. He twitches at the site and ducks his head. 

Abruptly, Shuichi wonders things best not put to name. But he wonders. 

With a polite smile he says, "H-hi! I'm here to ask about your son? We go to school together and-"

"He's dead."

Thoughts spark and die as the boy stares, his eyes taking in the excessive smoke behind the woman instead of her face. Her empty voice still echoes inside of his skull. Shuichi’s lungs feel empty, his chest gaping, and all he can do is clutch his bag tighter. Not even the bill of his hat can provide a buffer. Blinking, the boy tries to make sense of those almost bored words. The woman merely brings a mostly gone cigarette to her mouth for another drag.

"Could... Could you please clarify that?" Shuichi slowly asks as heavy spikes drive into his ribcage. 

Ouma’s mother releases odorous smoke into the air. 

"He's in a hospital about ready to drop dead. Hanahaki, some weird kind. Just bursts out of nowhere fully developed or something. Like if you repress shit then you get... Days," the woman says as her eyes drift. "Guess I can thank that boyfriend the idiot mentioned."

Shuichi’s barely remaining facade of casual anything dies. His hands start trembling as he looks down at his feet. The flowers in his lungs stir mockingly , and the little Usami hanging from his bag does the same. Words replay alongside the memories of Ouma’s face. Even the sound of his voice stutters about. A realization too, because Shuichi has read so much on hanahaki, that his flowers never fully left because Ouma Kokichi couldn't understand or acknowledge his own feelings. He knows exactly what the other boy has. 

Shuichi knows that he's killed the boy in love with him. 

By the time he's looking back up to Ouma’s mother- her drifting eyes are locked onto the Usami charm that Ouma has a match of. When her eyes fill with utter rage, he knows that she does too. 

"I'm-"

"Get out! Get out, just get out and never come here ever again!" the woman screeches as her eyes flood with agony and tears. 

"The hospital-"

But he stumbles back just as she claws to reach him. His hat, that Ouma bought for him, falls to the ground.

Just like the memory of Ouma’s hands in his, or how vulnerable the boy looked that one overnight stay. Fidgeting and emotionally raw after waking up from a nightmare. 

"I told you to leave! You stole my baby from me! You killed my baby! Just- just go away!”

He needs to find the hospital that Ouma is in. He needs to apologize, to see him, to try and do anything he can. He has to just find the hospital where Ouma is and go there. But all he can do is clutch his bag tighter, the sight of a broken woman sliding to the ground branded into his memory, and desperately run away as flowers bring the taste of blood to his tongue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. I think I genuinely am madder at Shuichi than I am Kokichi. Why? 
> 
> Because Kokichi genuinely didn’t do anything with the intention of hurting Shuichi. What he did was abhorrent, and he knows that, but it was partially a result of having a fucked up upbringing than anything else. In a way he's incapable of viewing things in the same healthier way that other people are. 
> 
> Shuichi though? Shuichi just wanted to hurt him instead of actually communicating. He was nothing but malicious the whole time. Not once did he think of it as wrong to do, and he even dragged Maki into it. You can say that he didn't actually consider Kokichi's feelings at all. 
> 
> Up until it bit him back. 
> 
> He feels really bad now.


	3. Results

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> People are cruel and so is nature.

For the first few hours there's not a single thing that makes sense. Hospital people keep coming into the room with all sorts of questions. The two people who call themselves his parents show up. Conversations might happen there, between people who might also be talking to him. It's all about flowers and his boyfriend. Something that results in a few nurses having to placate those pathetic genetic donators 

Kokichi wants to scream that Saihara isn't his boyfriend anymore, but he can't. All he manages is a weak little whisper that his father scoffs at. 

Nothing changes the fact that he's going to die. The look on his mother's face when he says just that is proof enough. Pinch and ugly, filling him up with more dread than satisfaction when his parents leave. Bolt is more like it- walking out and leaving Kokichi behind. His nurses and doctors linger awkwardly after that. Still, he's been aware enough to understand. A second explanation just isn't necessary. 

He deserves it. 

The boy stretches in his hospital bed and looks at his newest visitors. Men in suits, a girl with long blue hair, and a familiar boy with green. He's not sure what they're expecting him to say. Just that these Danganronpa people want a response. 

"I'm fucking dying," Kokichi says as he just barely lifts an arm covered in medical apparatuses. "And I would have already been dead! If it weren't for the fucking home invader deciding to check out the bathroom, and being really nice about it."

Amami smiles in a way that he somehow thinks is calming and says, "By accepting our offer you'll get the best care, be cured without invasive surgery, and contribute great to-"

"You obviously didn't hear the doctors when they told you that I denied assistance. I want to die," is the only way that Kokichi can make himself respond. 

A laugh rings out from the other person around his age, just as the girl with blue hair and blue eyes covers her mouth with her hand. Shirogane doesn't even seem to notice the stare that her companion is giving her. The boy himself just blinks as his arms start to itch again. If only he wasn't all but strapped down to prevent the hastening of his death. Not that it matters when he's got maybe two days before parts of him start shutting down. Kokichi's eyes glance over at the disapproving Amami. 

What the hell do these people expect to get from me, the boy wonders.

He just wants to die in this ugly little hospital room as his ugly little flowers eat up the rest of him. Complete and totally honest, that's all Kokichi wants. The choices that earned him this are ones that belong to him. Danganronpa might be a show that he tolerates, or even likes, but the boy has no interest in joining it like this. It wouldn't be anything but a at to mock Saihara. Something like that... Is an unbearable idea.

"Ouma-kun, you'll still die if you give consent. The only thing that we need from you is your body! It's the same for everyone that joins. None of the people that go into Danganronpa ever come out," Shirogane titters. Her smile feels like tar dripping down Kokichi's eyes. 

Instantly, he decides that he hates her.

Kokichi likewise decides to say absolutely nothing for the rest of visit. If he doesn't have to allow his parents in, then he doesn't have to give a shit about these people. After about five minutes of the silent treatment, and one nurse being very stern, Shirogane just smiles happily before slipping a card under Kokichi's right hand. She obviously knows that the boy isn't capable moving. The straps are more than obvious enough. He snarls at the girl as the whole group leaves, exhausted and to weak to resist fading out of unconsciousness. 

The nurse looks down at him with a just as tired pity. Her brown eyes and almost red hair are just as dull as Kokichi's heartbeat. Mostly awake still, he watches her careful remove the card and put it under a sad stuffed Monokuma. Then she picks up the flowers that Shirogane very cheerfully places on his bedside table. 

"Those people," the woman says, "Make me so sick. They're like ambulance chasers for young adults with atypical hanahaki. I never even knew about it all until I started working here... Ah, let me get you some ice chips."

The rest of what Kokichi remembers is one sided chatting and frozen water being melted by his mouth. Honestly, he isn't sure if he even fell asleep instead of had some cessation of thoughts. At some point someone may have woken him up for food. If so, the boy is pretty sure that all he did was puke flowers, blood, and saliva into a little plastic bucket-pan.

None of that matters either. Kokichi weaves in and out of awareness for the rest of the night. It's the only real relief from pain that he gets. All the medicine they've given him sucks at stopping the agony. Really, he's wondering when and if that tired nurse of his will wonder in with a tired little smile, a special bag of morphine to replace one of the things they have him hooked up to. Kokichi doesn't actually know how that works though. Maybe it won't be in a bag at all. It's just speculation and a cowardly hope that he won't actually have to feel himself get killed by these flowers. 

Faintly he can recall something else though, after coughing and pain, a color among red and gray. He's happy that he can't remember what it was. 

The next time he comes to fills him with lukewarm dissatisfaction. He falls under again. When he next wakes, there's someone at his bedside again- and Kokichi can't stop confusion from swallowing him up. It's simply impossible for this to be real, the boy soon tells himself. 

Saihara shouldn't be looking outside of Kokichi's hospital room window.

It's shocking to see the other boy. Kokichi has had so many fantasies about what to say. He's imagined so many happy endings, all in the privacy of his own mind, and just as many that end in nothing but pain. The truth is that the boy just can't comprehend the kind of relationship that he sees in books or movies. A happy and healthy outcome where two people smile and cry, safely removed flower at their feet- that's impossible. Even connections not based on the idea of 'use' are impossible to understand. There's never been anything else that he can recall. 

Just one pale face with red rimmed eyes that can't be real. The boy doesn't even have his hat on, and that's something that Kokichi hasn't seen in a while. Oddly fitting in the end. For Saihara to appear without the beloved hat that was gifted to him by Kokichi. He isn't made for happiness anyway, and he understands that he's only ever been a leaching the lifeblood of everyone around him. Kokichi's whole life has only ever been that. Saihara simply shouldn't be here. 

Actually, the older boy seriously shouldn't be here because no one would have told him at all.

Kokichi's parents are probably out getting high to celebrate the loss of an unwanted child. His teachers are probably preparing some kind of excuse for why Kokichi has died from hanahaki, one that doesn't make Saihara a target. The hospital is probably getting ready to hand over his abnormal corpse to some kind of lab. Danganronpa is probably licking its lips while looking at a phone. In essence, it's fucking impossible for Saihara to be in this room. 

Yet, the boy that is Kokichi's ex-boyfriend has just looked back over to him. Gold eyes and dark teal hair that both look frazzled, lips bitten, and an expression of utter... 

Words for Saihara's blatant emotions don't exist in Kokichi's dictionary. So he looks away instead of continuing to see them. It's less painful for him that way. The flowers insist on stirring despite that.

"Ah... Ouma-kun? I'm," Saihara distantly murmurs. "I'm sorry."

Something like a flinch runs down Kokichi's body. His eyes dart back to where his visitor sits. The other boy is close for anything like comfort. It's difficult to stay calm like this. Does or doesn't Saihara know why Kokichi is here, but the boy stays silent. Maybe it's better for him to see that face just once. Or maybe the twists of guilt are just going to make it more horrible. 

"I lied about it."

"What...?" comes a slow and painfully scratchy sound. That special syrup they gave him must have worn off. Kokichi's throat feels li-

"I lied about wanting to break up with you. I lied about dating Harukawa-san, and she doesn't even know about anything either. I wanted to- I wanted to make Ouma-kun jealous," the boy blurts out as he bows down as far as possible.

Drab. That's what Kokichi's hospital room is when you remove all the signs, like the bright yellow and red one above his bed. It says not to move and to call a nurse. There are a dozen little things like that. A TV that isn't going to get used. Dull and drab, just like the boy's flowers are. Even the horrible little Monokuma plush is absolutely boring. Nothing but a depressing pit to die in and everything reflects it. That's also not at all what Kokichi just heard from Saihara. 

Oh no, Ouma Kokichi just heard something excellently exciting. 

Purple eyes sunken into a near lifeless face stare. And stare. Until Saihara lifts his head and looks back down to his lap. 

A cough carrying the taste of blood and, "Why?" 

Why did you do that? Why did you tell me that? Why did you come here? Why couldn't you just say something else? Why even come here?

Saihara cringes and his eyes shift between his lap and Kokichi. The other boy opens his mouth, grimaces, and falls silent. For a moment that's the only sound in the room. Quiet. The beeping chug of machines and the chorus of business outside has faded away. There's only the quiet Saihara and the quiet dying boy. Another moment and trembling fingers reach into dark fabric- Saihara pulling a ziplock bag from his pocket. 

Kokichi stares blankly at the contents that Saihara holds out for him to see. He recognizes a few right away, like a kind of Amaryllis. Bluebells, white little Anemones intertwined with Honeysuckle, and a large black lily looking thing. 

Purple eyes instantly take in the hints of blood and saliva. He forces himself to pretend that he has no idea what this means. It even works for all of five seconds. Kokichi barks out a laugh and can't even wince at how wounded it sounds. Saihara has hanahaki for him. Of course the boy would, it makes sense, because he's the stupidest person that Kokichi knows. What an awful upperclassman this Danganronpa obsessed freak is. 

"Do you want me... to congratulate you?" he grits out. Suddenly, abruptly, all his scraps of death-compliance are gone. Only the haphazard mulch that haunts Kokichi's thoughts remain. "Well, tgreat for- you!" 

Kokichi watches Saihara perk up with confusion and manages an amused smile. 

If Saihara has hanahaki and Kokichi dies…

Lying is better. Lying is the only safe thing that Kokichi can do. His fingers twitch sporadically as sleep whispers across his eyelids. If the boy just lies then maybe Saihara will stop loving him. Everything even remotely sentimental about Kokichi's current state has to be left out. Covered up and slapped in with the truth.

Kokichi slowly says, voice empty and pained, "From the start, I just wanted some benefits from being friends. These aren't for you and I hate you."

“You're disgusting, Saihara.”

Tears well up inside of the other boy's eyes. Somehow, it's one of the more painful things that Kokichi has ever done. He can't comprehend a single reason why, except that it's obvious. Making Saihara hate him should, might, make the hanahaki stop. Kokichi can admit that he has no idea of it'll work. The past few days have been nothing but the surety of his death and trying to figure out flowers. All amidst futile fantasies of apologies or miracles. 

Miracles don't exist in reality. Only fluctuations in probability that become known as them. Not ever in his life has Kokichi ever had something like a miracle occur to him. He's always made his own.

"Ouma-kun is lying! There's no way that I'd believe that!" Saihara soon protests as the bag of flowers drops. 

Huffing, Kokichi turns away from him and murmurs, "Aren't you a little bit weird? A lily like that can't be good. Besides, Saihara really pressured me into accepting that confession too. He's even trying to say strange things on my deathbed too..."

A choked noise drifts over from where Saihara sits. Silence again fills the room, and the boy that Kokichi has spent hours kissing whispers, "Just stop, Ouma-kun."

"F-uhck you!" the boy hisses, eyes squeezing shut as flowers and stomach acid start crawling inside of his esophagus. He shudders and tries to resist, but Saihara is already in his space with soft touches and softer muttering- the pan held out. 

It's painful because things are progressing inside of him. It takes forever and he refuses to even open his eyes. It's awful because the boy can tell that his flowers are real now. It hurts because Saihara gets see each fucked up little emotion that Kokichi still can't understand. It's disgusting, stupid, and when Saihara asks if Kokichi is done- he shakes his head and pukes some more. 

"Hh-h...hate y-you!" Kokichi blindly coughs, hand clinging onto Saihara's with an iron grip. Burning beads of saline and snot drip into the bucket. Doubtlessly full of all those horrible things that people find so romantic. "I hate you!" 

It's a lie and Saihara stays quiet. 

But still, he stays.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Today I learned that finding hanakotoba meanings is fucking frustrating because it's just a fucking mess out there. Like the Kuroyuri/Chocolate Lily? No idea if any part of it is legitimately hanakotoba. It was just too fitting though. And it lines up with how I've seen similar looking lilies used in fanart. So. 
> 
> I gathered up each possible meaning for each flower that I could find. That said, they aren't really outlined in the fic itself because, quite frankly, Kokichi doesn't really give a shit. He's dying, Jim. 
> 
> Kokichi's hanahaki flowers: Red Spider Lilies, Purple Hyacinth, Yellow Camellia, Purple Lilac, and Sweet Peas. 
> 
> Red Spider Lilies: never to meet again, lost memory, abandonment   
> Hyacinth, Purple: I am sorry, sorrow, please forgive me  
> Camellia, Yellow: longing   
> Sweet Peas: departure, good-bye, delicate pleasure, tender memory, blissful pleasure   
> Lilac, Purple: first emotions of love, first love
> 
>  
> 
> Shuichi’s hanahaki flowers: Amaryllis. Bluebells, White Anemones, Honeysuckle, and Kuroyuri/Chocolate Lily. 
> 
> Amaryllis: pride, splendid beauty, shy  
> Bluebell: humility, constancy, grateful, unchanging heart  
> Anemone, White: sincere, truth, expection, hope  
> Chocolate Lily: love, curse, never-ending love, lust  
> Honeysuckle: bonds of love, devotion, generous
> 
>  
> 
> I'd be thankful to see your interpretation of both the fic, it's possible endings, and the hanahaki flowers.

**Author's Note:**

> Doth he die? We don't know.


End file.
